It was plausible that I was a poor judge of character.

Actually, it was maybe likely that I was a poor judge of character.

It just hadn’t been evident to me so far, but to be fair, Lieutenant Ilsa was a lot. Maybe that was an unfair thought, but I couldn’t help but feel a little weird about how exactly she was treating me now that she knew I was a White Mage. Her gaze had been locked onto me for a while now as we sat in Lord Balar’s apartment, and I almost thought she wasn’t blinking.

This Fallen Leaves thing seemed to be a significant component of it. Yet I didn’t know where to start.

And I was still avoiding the big issue.

I had just fought a person I would swear was my sister. Was she my sister? A part of me said yes. Undeniably, it was her, yet how much I could trust that part of me was a significant question.

How much I could trust any part of myself was another question.

Sara had messed with my emotions. A connection I had taken for granted was now something I couldn’t help but feel a slight weariness for.

Sara hadn’t spoken for a while, and I wasn’t sure what we could say to each other when the time came.

Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore, “Where do we start?” I stated plainly.

Lieutenant Ilsa frowned, went to open her mouth, closed it again, and then sighed, “To be honest, I’m not sure. I never thought I would meet a White Mage, especially not one who wasn’t working with the Empire of Gold.”

Alina was sitting off to the side and looking between us. She gradually started to look slightly frustrated, her mouth quirking down into a frown.

“Well, maybe some common ground,” I suggested, feeling incredibly weary from the earlier physical exertion, “What exactly do you intend to do now that you know I’m a White Mage.”

“Guard and protect you,” the answer was immediate.

“I don’t—" I paused. I had been about to say I didn’t need protection, and more than that, I didn’t want anyone laying their lives on the line to protect me.

“I don’t need protection,” I said softly.

Lieutenant Ilsa frowned, and there was weight to this expression, “You were attacked today. A Black Mage wants you dead. Even not regarding that both the Kingdom of Glass and the Empire of Gold will take umbrage at your existence for one reason or another.”

Right, but still, “I don’t want anyone laying their lives on the line in front of me.”

I had already had, frankly, far too much of that. How much of my family's lives had I ruined with my illness? Even now, with my sister, or at least something that looked so much like my sister…

I pushed my thoughts away from that for now. If I had come here, it was plausible other people, including her, could have come to. On the other hand, there was something that she had said.

“Still, I suppose it’s something to know there’s another White Mage. I had thought the only ones left were the ones owned by the Empire of Gold and that broken one in the Long Mountains.”

“The Black Mage said there was another White Mage in the Long Mountains,” I said slowly. That gives us a location if we could find them…”

I trailed off, my mind worried with thought.

What then? How would I convince the White Mage to come home? More than that, would they be safe if I contacted them? What did it mean that they were broken?

Broken could have a lot of meanings.

“Even if we did find them? What then? How would you convince them to help you?” Alina prodded lightly.

I bit my lip and looked down. I didn’t know. I didn’t know a lot of things right now.

“If there’s another White Mage, we should find them, and what do you mean ‘help you?’” Lieutenant Ilsa said, a deep frown creasing her face as she looked at Alina.

They locked eyes, and Alina’s face creased into a minute frown at Lieutenant Ilsa.

Well, this was treading awfully close to something I wasn’t super keen to discuss, even with Lieutenant Ilsa’s recent change in allegiance.

I looked at Lieutenant Ilsa. I didn’t want to lie. I hated lying.

Really, there should be no reason to worry about informing Lieutenant Ilsa if what she said was true. If she truly felt that she had to protect me, she would be glad to help me heal Sara.

Except I wasn’t sure who I should trust.

Alina knew I needed to heal someone in the Great Forest. No one knew it was Sara—the Great Tree.

I felt as if I was to be suffocated in these falsehoods.

Even with everything that had just happened with Sara, I still cared for her, the care one has for one's family.

I felt the same care for the woman I thought was my sister.

I flexed my hand thoughtfully, looking at my palm before I looked up at Ilsa and replied, “It’s complicated. There’s someone I need to heal, and I need other White Mages to heal them.”

Lieutenant Ilsa looked at me, her eyes piercing me to my chair, “Someone,” a shadow crossed her face, “I see.”

Was it just my imagination, or were her eyes not entirely focused on me? Not for a lack of effort, but almost as if she was having physical trouble looking at me.

I had forgotten something. I sniffed the air and once again confirmed the smell of Black Magic in the room, which was almost overpowering in this proximity.

“Lieutenant Ilsa,” I said slowly, “I need to ask: are you aligned with the Black Mages?”

Lieutenant Ilsa started backward, her eyes widening in shock, “What? How could you ask something like that?”

It seemed real, I thought as I looked at her, but there was something else, something she wasn’t saying.

I stood up and looked at Lieutenant Ilsa with a stern expression. “You have the scent of Black Magic on you,” I said bluntly. I want to know why.”

Lieutenant Ilsa’s eyes widened, and something was known there: guilt.

“I, It is not something talked about…” she murmured, and her eyes shifted away from me, attempting to avoid my gaze.

Some of me felt guilty for pushing, yet I could not afford not to know.

“I need to know,” I said quietly, taking a deep breath and quickly checking my depleted magic reserves.

Lieutenant Ilsa looked down, “I would ask that you not judge too harshly,” she said quietly.

A long moment of silence stretched through the room before she spoke once more, “When the Fallen Leaves failed to protect the White Mages, and they died out, the Elves were exiled from the Great Forest. It was decided that there had to be accountability. Maybe if we held ourselves accountable, the Great Tree would forgive us.”

Those words struck and unable to help myself, I asked, “Whose ‘we?’”

Lieutenant Ilsa looked at me, somewhat confused, “Well, the Lords and Ladies of the Elves. The Fallen Leaves were brought to trial all of us who still lived, as some had already chosen to take their own lives honorably. It was decided that our punishment for our blindness would be to become blind ourselves. A magic curse was placed on each of us and all who would descend from our lines by a Black Mage that would eventually take our eyesight away. A just punishment.”

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

That. That was awful.

“To be clear,” I said slowly, “Every Fallen Leaf was cursed to become blind.”

“Yes,” Lieutenant Ilsa nodded. I admit it will limit my usefulness to you. My vision has already begun to fade as I have overused my eyes. My eyesight is no longer close to what an Elf should be but perhaps closer to a human’s.”

My mouth tasted sour. Something fiery was twisting and tearing at my gut.

“They blinded you,” I whispered.

Sara shifted to the back of my mind, but I ignored the feeling. I didn’t care what Sara thought. Or what the Elven Lords and Ladies thought.

I stepped forward and gently pressed my hand against the seated Lieutenant Ilsa’s forehead.

I could feel the Black Magic.

Heal.

My reserves, maybe sitting at about half, lashed out, burning through the Black Magic. It tried to escape back like smoke fleeing, but I instinctively focused on encircling it before I drew the Black Magic clear out.

I narrowed my focus on the eyes, feeling the degradation before I began to sew them back together, restoring order to what was once distorted and fading. It wasn’t quite perfect. It needed to be cleansed.

I did have a source of cleansing on my person though.

I shifted my other hand to grab the dragon claw I carried, drawing the purifying energy through the talon.

Like fire, it burned through the remaining corrupting presence.

Feeling drained, I stepped back, and the claw was again lessened.

“What, what did you do?” Lieutenant Ilsa looked at me as if with new eyes; to be fair, her eyes might as well be brand new.

“I healed you,” I said shortly.

Lieutenant Ilsa shook her head, “No, I deserved it. For failing, it was only right that I- “

I glared at her, “You deserved to go blind, is that it?” Something angry had welled up in me, but at least this, I was sure, was my own anger, “That’s not right. To curse you and every child for what? It wouldn’t bring anyone back. It wouldn’t help anything at all. Leon Silverleaf has the audacity to ask to be allowed back into the Great Forest. Yet, an eternal punishment is deserved for Fallen Leaves, who dedicated themselves to the White Mages.”

Lieutenant Ilsa looked at me, seemingly dumbstruck, “We failed…”

I shook my head ferociously, “I don’t care. It’s not right.”

I didn’t know where these feelings were coming from.

Well, perhaps I did. Had I not suffered my own debilitation? Was there anything that would justify purposely cursing an entire group of people and every one of their children and their children’s children?

Whatever had happened to the White Mages, it wasn’t worth this.

Lieutenant Ilsa gazed at me with a torn expression. It looked like she wanted to protest, but perhaps because I was a White Mage, she didn’t know how.

As the anger settled, I took a deep breath, realizing I may have overstepped my bounds; I hadn’t given her a choice; I had acted.

I spoke again slowly, hesitantly, “I’m sorry,” I said, “I overstepped my bounds.”

Lieutenant Ilsa looked at me, eyes tracing my face as if seeing me for the first time, which was probably true in a way.

“I- “she hesitated uncharacteristically, “I find myself deeper in your debt.”

There was something unspoken here, but I wasn’t sure what the exact words of such an unspoken thing was.

There was a knocking at the door, and I twisted about to face it. I glanced at my compatriots, who glanced at me with some indecision warring through them.

Shaking myself, I walked up to the door and opened it to find Tol. We locked eyes, and I suppressed any facial expression that might have come to my face.

“Uh, hello?” I questioned hesitantly.

Strangely enough, Tol looked unsure, before gesturing slightly inward to the room, “May I come in.”

Now really wasn’t the time, but something stopped those words from reaching my lips. I shrugged, “Sure.”

He walked inside and locked eyes with the other people in the room, who looked straight back. Tol looked confused. Alina’s face hardened into a smooth but friendly smile, and Lieutenant Ilsa’s gaze didn’t shift away from me.

The silence was terrible, but it seemed I was the only one who was going to break it.

“Tol, did you need something?” I questioned the dwarf.

Tol turned back to me, his beard shifting with the movement of his lips, “You saved my life,” he said bluntly.

The gaze of the room was locked on me, making me feel strangely nervous.

“I didn’t do anything,” I replied, instinctively glancing away.

Tol growled, “Do not try and shame me. You held a building over my head to prevent me from getting crushed. You bought me the time to successfully make a tunnel using my magic.”

I frowned, looking back at him. “That tunnel you made also allowed me to escape.”

Tol looked angrier, “No. Do not trick me. You could have dug your way out at any time, leaving me to die. You risked your life for me. Do not demean that debt.”

Alina and Lieutenant Ilsa’s gazes were both focused on me at his words, and wistfully for a moment; I wished to be anywhere but here.

Still, I wouldn’t get out of this, “What’s your point?” I asked softly, finally locking eyes with him.

Tol frowned and looked down, flexing his hands slightly, “Until we are even, you may ask of me anything. Armor, Weapons, I will make what you require. After all, it is only with your aid that I seem to have found myself able to use Green Magic again.”

Well, it wasn’t a bodyguard, which, as of now, I counted myself fortunate.

“Right, uh, well, thanks,” I nodded slowly.

Tol looked at me firmly before he reached out a burly hand, and after a moment of hesitation, I replied and shook hands firmly with him, matching his pressure.

Tol nodded firmly and turned away, marching out the door as quickly as he came.

I followed him and then shut the door behind them, feeling very bemused. Tol really was one of the strangest people I had met since coming here.

I turned back around to meet two separate glares.

Alina spoke first, “What did he mean ‘risked your life.’”

“It was nothing,” I shook my head, “I- “

Alina’s glare intensified, and I reconsidered what I was about to say.

“He was in the tower with me,” I sighed, “I helped him get out.”

This time, Lieutenant Ilsa spoke, “He said you risked your life. Did you?” her tone was blunt as she looked at me.

I shrugged helplessly, “I didn’t have a choice. He would have been crushed if I had tried to dig it out myself. All I did was hold up the building remnants, and then he made a tunnel for us.”

Lieutenant Ilsa shook her head, “You could have died protecting one person. We need the White Mages.”

Her face was cold as she glared at me.

Alina’s face was more expressive, and she looked somewhat apprehensive as she asked a single question: “What would have happened if he hadn’t managed to make a tunnel?”

She was looking at me with a strange expression; there was something painful there.

I shook my head, frustrated despite myself, “It was fine. I had it under control.”

“Jamie.”

I winced, looking down, not liking how she said my name, “I didn’t have that much energy left, but I could have probably survived.”

It was a lie. I knew it was a lie. We would have been buried if Tol hadn’t managed to make a tunnel before my magic failed.

I looked up, locked eyes with Alina, and knew she knew I had lied.

_-_

The danger was passed for now. I had walked the streets and not smelled a trace of Black Magic.

Yet there was a gloomy atmosphere, possibly just surrounding me. Or maybe that was too self-centered. Haven was undergoing reconstruction as the city tried to piece itself back together, and the people seemed shocked by what had occurred. The normally bustling streets were lifeless, and people hurried back and forth as if they didn’t want to be outside too long.

I sighed, boots thumping against the paved streets.

Lord Balar was performing the finishing touches on the research on where exactly the White Mage was. Lieutenant Ilsa had disappeared to ‘tie up some loose ends’ and a warning to run if I smelled Black Magic. Alina had also said there was something she needed to see, too, though she hadn’t said what. Things were tense between Alina and me, and I wasn’t quite sure why.

Since our conversation, she hasn’t necessarily avoided me; rather, she has given me little time by myself. There was an air of concern and worry when she looked at me. She hadn’t said anything, and I didn’t know how to broach the subject.

I wasn’t sure why she was so concerned. It’s not like I had a death wish.

Well, I supposed it wouldn’t be too terrible if I died, though. I had already died once. What was dying once more?

I grimaced at my thoughts and wondered, not for the first time if something was wrong with me. I had been thinking about my actions since I had come to this world. I had put my life on the line several times but hadn’t thought about it.

In the relative privacy of my own head, I could acknowledge that, though having died once, I wasn’t necessarily terrified to die again. The greatest fear of death before was the unknown and what I would leave behind without me.

I knew death.

On the other hand, what I would leave behind me…

I sighed. These thoughts weren’t helpful. Sara nudged softly at my mind, and a soft warmth flowed through me.

Well, I was mostly by myself right now, so now was probably a good time as any. I focused on Sara’s presence.

“Sara, can we talk?” I murmured.

The warmth shifted and stretched before a single word came back.

Yes.

A thousand questions flowed through my mind, but I needed to focus on the pertinent ones.

“What was that? Why were you so angry? Why did you,” I hesitated, “take away my control.”

Hesitation. Reluctance. Fear of loss of another child.

I could understand that, but “You tried to override me,” I whispered painfully.

A long moment then, Fear. Child stopped fighting. Would have been overcome. Would have died.

I wanted to protest, but Sara was right. I had stopped moving. I had stopped fighting. If she hadn’t flushed through my system, would the Black Mage, who looked like my sister, have managed to end me?

Her words at the end flowed through my mind.

“I’m saving the world. The world that the White Mages doomed.”

It seemed like crazy talk. Alina and Lieutenant Ilsa hadn’t even mentioned it, but…

“Sara, can you tell me anything about what the White Mages were doing before they died?”

The words were blunt, somewhat callous, but I had to know.

Hesitation. Possibly. Memories of the First Child.

I frowned, trying to parse the thoughts, “You can show me your memories of the ‘First Child?’ What do they know?”

Something pushed through my mind, and suddenly, I was looking through the eyes of a humanoid Sara as I talked to a familiar-looking White Mage with long silver hair. I realized instantly that I recognized him from the glass window in front of the library where I had found Lord Balar when I had first entered the city.

He looked weak and pale as he lay against a massive tree trunk, “I’m sorry, Mother. I tried to save you. My sister has used her Black Magic to locate the source of your sickness, but she failed.” He chuckled sadly, “I failed. I thought I could heal you. I am the First of the White Mages. My power should be enough; it should’ve been enough.” He looked down, “There’s something else I can try. I’ll be gone a while. Take care of my brothers and sisters.”

He struggled to his feet, and then, with slow steps, he began to walk away.

A whispered promise flowed through the air, “If death will try and take you, Mother, then I shall end death itself.”

Suddenly, I was back where I had been standing, and I took a deep breath, steadying myself against a building wall.

Erbor. The First Child.

Erbor had come up a couple of times, made contact with the Sea Horses, and helped found the Kingdom of Glass. In Sara's memory, he had looked so weak and tired.

Had he really said he was going to end death itself?

“I’m saving the world. The world that the White Mages doomed.”

“What happened to him?” I asked softly.

Sorrow. He did not come back.